


Open When...

by CrayolaRainbow



Category: The Bright Sessions (Podcast)
Genre: College, Fluff, M/M, Post-Canon, Tooth-Rotting Fluff
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-13
Updated: 2019-04-23
Packaged: 2020-01-12 19:38:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,149
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18453263
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrayolaRainbow/pseuds/CrayolaRainbow
Summary: Open when you're sad, open when you're angry, open when you finish your midterms...In which Caleb is the best, most thoughtful boyfriend ever.





	1. Open When You Need A Kiss

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MaikaMaika](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MaikaMaika/gifts).



> Beta'd by the wonderful Maika, go follow her over on [tumblr!](https://maikamaika.tumblr.com/)
> 
> ~~I'd like to thank the Academy~~ I'd like to thank all of my friends who read this before I posted and told me how good it was. Thank you Sonya and Elena!
> 
> I wrote the majority of chapter one in November during NaNoWriMo and finally wrote enough of chapter two during Camp NaNo to feel comfortable posting chapter one. Chapter two will be out as soon as I slather it in some polish and finish writing it.

Adam sighs and closes last desk drawer, the last of his schools supplies stowed away. Adam turns to look at his progress and sighs. His bed is still covered in all the stuff they had crammed into the back of the car and dumped out onto his bed this morning so his parents could leave.

He’s mostly stowed away the big things like his mini fridge and drawer units and shit, but the suitcases with all his clothes and shit still sit in the middle of the floor, taunting him.

Adam sighs and kneels down in front of his suitcase, still not quite ready to tackle the stuff on his bed. He unzips the suitcase slowly and starts taking out his clothes, groaning all the while.

_“Hrrrrrrrrrrrggg—”_

Adam blinks, surprised at the box tucked away at the bottom of his suitcase. It looks like one of those decorative boxes you’d see at Hobby Lobby or something. Whoever put the box in Adam’s suitcase has covered every inch in stickers. There’s stickers from his favorite bands and podcasts, adorable stickers of puppies and kittens, and stickers from some of the anime Adam and Caleb had watched together. There's a couple stickers from musicals they'd watched with the atypical gang too.

Adam gently lifts the box out of his suitcase and sets it on his bed. It’s a lot heavier than he expected. He flips open the lid. Resting on the tissue paper is a bright green envelope with “Open this first” written in Caleb’s handwriting on the front.

Adam flips the envelope around and laughs at the little smiley face sticker sealing the envelope shut. He opens the flap and unfolds the letter inside.

_Adam—_

_This is an “Open when” box. Inside are a bunch of letters I’ve written and some mini care packages for you to open when the apply to you. BUT THERE ARE RULES!!!_

_Rule Number 1: No Peeking! I’ll know if you do._

_Rule Number 2: Open whenever they apply to you._

_Rule Number 3: Don't lose the notes! Keep them so you can read them when you feel that way again._

_I’ve written the rules on a separate card because I know you’ll want to keep the notes pinned to your cork board or something, you dork._

_Feel free to look through them now, but make sure you don't open them until they apply to you! I’d like for these to last for the whole year, but if you run out, let me know. I can make you a new batch at Christmas or something. If you’re having a particularly shitty week you can open as many as you need. Hell, you can open all of them if you think it’ll help._

_I just want you to have this reminder that I love you, even though you’re at Yale and I’m not. None of this is a replacement for actually talking, you can still call me whenever you need._

_I love you so so fucking much. I feel like I’m going to burst sometimes with how much I love you. I miss you already._

_-Love, Caleb._

Adam wipes away a tear and smiles. Caleb had drawn a big green heart at the end of his letter, big enough to fill the rest of the page. He wants to call his amazing boyfriend right now to thank him and to tell Caleb how much he loves him, but Caleb had made Adam promise that he wouldn’t call until he was completely unpacked and settled in.

Adam pulls out the extra large index card out of the envelope. Written on the card are the rules Caleb had laid out in his letter in bright blue sharpie. Adam pins the card to the cork board above his desk like Caleb suggested and slides the letter back into the envelope.

Adam rushes through the rest of his unpacking, slamming drawers shut in his haste. He doesn't care about the fact that he has brand new neighbors on either side of his room. He finishes in record time, sliding the last of the now empty suitcases under his bed before standing up with a flourish. He jumps up and sits on the bed with a bit of a bounce.

Adam looks at the contents of the box, neatly wrapped in tissue paper and tucked inside. He briefly considers opening it slowly with minimum tearing, before saying “Fuck it” and tears it open like it’s Christmas morning.

Adam’s mouth drops open as the tissue paper falls away to reveal dozens of brightly colored envelopes and a rainbow of taped up paper bags like the kind you put party favors in. The envelopes are all organized in neat rows and the bags are stacked in one corner of the box.

Adam flips through the envelopes: “Open when you’re happy, open when you’re sad, open when you’re stressed…” The envelopes go on and on. It was like Caleb had thought of every possible emotion that Adam could possibly feel while away at college and had prepared for every outcome. Hungry, lonely, depressed, excited. Angry, tired, frustrated, proud. There were even envelopes for events and things that couldn’t be boiled down to one simple word for that emotion. Open when you need a laugh, Open when you miss me, Open when you can’t sleep.

Adam shuffles through the bags, wondering what else Caleb could possibly have thought to include that he hadn’t already covered. The first package isn’t so much a taped down bag as it is a full on wrapped box like it's his birthday or something. It’s a lot heavier than he expected too. There's a slight clinking, rattling sound of something tapping against glass as he picks it up and moves it around. Adam smiles as he reads the label on top. “Open when you need a kiss”. Adam snorts and sets it down on the bed and moves on to the others. Open when you finish your midterms, open when it's Halloween, Open when your roommate drives you nuts.

Adam methodically goes through every single package and envelope. Caleb had even thought as far as sorting the envelopes and packages into a happier emotions side and a sadder emotions side. Adam is careful to keep everything in its proper section as the empties out the box and lays it all on his bed.

Adam gazes in wonder out at the rainbow sea of envelopes and packages all laid out in front of him for a few moments before snapping to. Adam frantically pats himself down down and shuffles through the envelopes, looking for his phone.

“A ha!” Adam slides his phone out from where he was sitting on it. He can’t seem to manage to unlock his phone fast enough to call Caleb.

“Come on, come on, pick up!” Adam taps his finger on the back of his phone, leg bouncing in anticipation underneath him.

There was a soft click. “Hey college boy.” Caleb’s voice hits Adam’s ears and covers his body like a warm blanket. Joy starts bubbling in him like a volcano about to burst just from hearing his voice.

“Holy shit Caleb! Like, holy shit!” Adam exclaims, crashing past all the usual pleasantries that he never bothers with around Caleb anyways. He’s unable to keep his joy locked up inside any longer.

“So I take it you found the box?” Caleb asks.

“Yeah I found the box! What the fuck dude, like, what the hell? Its too much!”

“But, do you like it?”

And oh, Adam can hear the slight hesitation in Caleb’s voice, the slight twinge of worry in his words. Did Caleb really think that Adam might not like it?

“Of course I like it! I love it. Babe, this is the nicest, most thoughtful thing anyone’s ever done for me,” Adam says.

“Really? Oh, well, I’m glad you like it.”

“How did you even manage to fit this much stuff in? And how did the box get into my suitcase in the first place?”

“Aw, Adam, I’m hurt, I thought you knew I have superpowers!” Caleb says, and Adam can hear the shit eating grin Caleb has on his face.

Adam waves his hand. “Yeah, yeah, but you and I both know that’s not anywhere close to how it works. Come on, tell meeeee,” Adam whines.

“A magician never reveals his secrets.” Caleb laughs, and Adam can imagine Caleb wiggling his fingers like an idiot.

Adam sticks his tongue out at Caleb, like the mature adult that he is.

“Did you just stick your tongue out at me!?” Caleb laughs. “You dork.”

‘Says the guy who was wiggling his fingers around like a magician like two seconds ago, you meathead,” Adam retorts.

“How did you—”

“HA! I knew it!”

“Ha, ha, very funny. You just had a lucky guess.”

“No, I just know you Caleb Michaels, and you are absolutely the kind of person who wiggles his fingers while claiming to be a magician.”

“Oh no, oh darn, you know me too well, the romance is gone. What a disaster,” Caleb deadpans. “Guess we’ll just have to do something about that.” Adam can practically hear Caleb waggling his eyebrows at him.

“I think you’ve got the romance bit down pat with this box,” Adam says. “I guess I’m gonna have to step up my game next time we see each other.”

“Oooo, exciting. I’m counting down the days.”

Adam sighs and flops backwards onto his bed, careful not to land on any of the envelopes or packages. “I miss you so fucking much.”

“Yeah, me too.” There's a long pause. “How was the drive down?”

Adam swears he gets whiplash from the sudden topic change, but he plays along, grateful for the distraction.

“Oh, it was _greaaat_ ” Adam says sarcastically. “My dad made me drive almost the whole way over. He said that I, and I quote,” Adam tucks his chin into his neck and makes his voice deeper in a bastardized impression of his father. “‘You’ll be driving by yourself all the time once you get to Yale.’ And then he said, I shit you not, 'And besides, Caleb will be 700 miles away. You won't be able to rely on him to drive you around when you don’t feel like it.'”

“He actually said that? What the fuck!” Caleb exclaims.

“I know, right?! We hadn’t even left the neighborhood yet! I don't think he meant for it to sound that awful though. He was vagueing at me every time you picked me up all summer saying that I should drive more. He just never put it that bluntly.”

“Jesus. Still a shitty thing to say.”

“Mmmm. How was your drive?”

“Not too bad. Alice cried when we left, so that sucked. I kept fucking getting waves of sadness from my parents the whole drive over, which put a huge fucking damper on the trip. I got a big spike of road rage from the guy in front of us in traffic right outside of Ann Arbor which was kinda scary, but it went away pretty quick. Still made sure to avoid him for the rest of the trip.”

“ _Jesus_. How’d your parent’s react?”

“Honestly, I don’t think my mom noticed at all,” Caleb says. “She was dozing in the back seat at the time. I think my dad noticed when I started doing some of my breathing exercises, but he didn’t say anything.” 

“Mmmm," Adam hums. "How’d saying goodbye go last night?” Adam asks softly. It’s something Caleb had been worrying about in the weeks and days leading up to them leaving for school. It had gotten worse the closer to departure day he got. Adam had spent more than one night texting or Caleb to distract him long enough so that he could go to sleep.

Caleb sighs. ”My mom was a mess. I miss them both already, and I was sad to see them go, but god, in that moment it was so _fucking_ overwhelming. I didn’t want to cry, but then _she_ started to cry, and then my _dad_ started to tear up, so of course _I_ started crying too. We were a big weepy mess"

“Awwww, that’s sweet. Have you met your roommate yet?”

“Yeah, he seems like an okay dude. He’s a big ball of joy, it’s fucking weird. I’ve known him for a day and half and he hasn’t stopped smiling. It's kinda nice right now because he's drowning out everyone else in the dorms, kinda like with football.”

“Well that's good at least. How’s the ‘Living in the same building with hundreds of other students’ thing going?”

“Not nearly as good. The transition from my own bed in sleepy suburbia to a dorm room in the middle of campus was _rough_ last night. There are a _lot_ of sad people right now.” Caleb sighs. “I’m not looking forward to this,” he whines.

“Have you gotten a chance to find an emotionally quiet spot to chill out yet?” Adam asks.

“I did a pass of all the libraries this morning like you suggested. I think I found one that I can go to when things get overwhelming," Caleb says. "Its open all night and there's some study nooks that don't look _awful_ for napping in. There's a common room on the bottom floor of my dorm, but I doubt that'll help with avoiding the emotions of a bunch of stressed and wasted college students.”

“I can’t believe you’re getting this excited over a library.” Adam teases.

“Hey man, it’s a cool library. Checks all my boxes and its close to my dorm”

“Oh ho ho, it checks all your boxes AND its close to your dorm? My my Caleb, should I be getting jealous?” Adam gives an exaggerated pout and tries not to smile.

Caleb laughs. “What? Nah. You’re the only repository of knowledge for me baby, I thought you knew that.”

Adam can’t help it, he busts out laughing. “You’re the only repository of knowledge for me,” he says between gasps of air. “ _Jesus_ Caleb, that’s the worst fucking pick up line I’ve ever heard.”

Caleb starts laughing too and pretty soon they’ve both devolved into a couple of giggling idiots.

“I love you so fucking much Adam Hayes.” Caleb says after they’ve finally calmed down.

Adams heart soars at Caleb’s words. He can practically feel the warmth of Caleb’s love seeping into his bones. Caleb may be the one with empathy powers, but it hits Adam like a truck every time he hears those three little words and gets a reminder that yes, Caleb really does love Adam. That it’s all real and he’s not making it up in his head.

“I love you so fucking much too Caleb Michaels.”

They lay there for a while, just listening to each other’s breathing through the phone.

Caleb breaks the silence. “I wish I could kiss you right now,”

“Ugh, don’t remind me.”

“Yeah… Look, I gotta go right now, do you wanna skype me after class on Monday?”

“Yeah, sounds good.”

“Hey, I love you. Don't forget that, okay? That's the whole point of the letters and the packages, so you’ll have a constant reminder the whole year.”

“Yeah, okay. I love you too, Caleb. Thank you for being the best boyfriend ever.”

“Love you.” There's a click as Caleb hangs up.

Adam lays there for a few minutes, basking in the warm fuzzy feeling that always comes after he talks to Caleb. God he loves that boy so fucking much.

He turns his head towards the box and feels a sharp pang of guilt for not thinking to do something similar for Caleb. He squashes that guilt down, and just resolves himself to get Caleb a really good Christmas present to make up for it.

One of the packages catches Adam’s eye as he’s looking at them and he sits up so he can dig it out of the pile. It’s the first package he had pulled out of the box, the one marked “Open when you need a kiss.”

Adam shrugs. Now seems as good a time as any. He really, really wants to kiss Caleb thanks to that phone call.

Adam rips apart the valentine's day themed paper and opens the cardboard box to reveal a giant pickle jar filled to the brim with Hershey’s kisses.

Adam laughs as he rotates the jar to see all the kisses inside. Caleb seems to have given him a bit of variety, so he doesn't get sick of just one type of kiss. By and large though the overwhelming majority is his favorite, dark chocolate.

Adam flips over the heart shaped tag tied around the mouth of the jar. “A jar of kisses just for you.” Caleb had even drawn a little green heart at the end.

_What a sap,_ Adam thinks, shaking his head.

Adam unscrews the lid and fishes a kiss out. He snaps a pic of it resting in the palm of his hand and texts it to Caleb with a bunch of heart emojis before eating it.

Between kisses he packs everything back into the box and stowes it away under his bed. He sticks the jar of kisses down there too, at least until he can explain to his here to unknown roommate that there's no way in hell he’s sharing.


	2. Stressed

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by the wonderful MaikaMaika. Thank youuuuu!!!!!

Adam has to be honest, he forgets that the letters even exist for the first couple weeks of school.

Between classes, homework, and adjusting to dorm life, he doesn't get a chance to have a moment alone with his thoughts. He’s too focused on keeping his grades up to even think about being stressed or anything other than school until his body forces him to.

~~~~~

It’s been a bad week.

He’s got a group project in his English class that’s worth 20% of his grade. His partners completely drop the ball once he lets slip that he intends to become an English major, leaving him to do the majority of the work and drag the rest of them along kicking and screaming to the finish line.

On top of that he walks into his World History class on Wednesday and is the first person to get asked a question on the reading that he forgot to do. And it’s the one day, _the one day_ he forgets to bring his textbook. _Of_ course. He promptly gets kicked out of class and has to make the trek back to his dorm in the pouring rain.

He’s definitely not crying, he’s not, he’s _not._ It’s just the rain. He tastes a little bit of salt and— 

Oh. 

Adam sniffles and it’s like the floodgates are opened. He rushes through campus, keeping his head down. He’s suddenly grateful for the rain. Hardly anyone’s outside right now because of the downpour. Everyone’s either in class or holing up inside until they absolutely have to move to another building. The people who _are_ outside are too busy trying to make it to their destination as fast as possible without slipping or stepping in a puddle to notice a weeping freshman who should be in class right now.<

As soon as he gets back to his blessedly empty dorm room Adam flops onto his bed and screams into his pillow. He screams and cries and whines and lets out all the stress that’s been building since before he even set foot on campus. He wishes he could call Caleb, but he’s in class right now. 

_**Caleb** didn’t forget his reading,_ Adam thinks to himself and scowls. 

Adam rolls over and stares off towards his desk where the giant jar of kisses now resides. Oh. Right. Caleb had made him care packages for exactly this sort of situation. Adam unscrews the jar and grabs a few kisses before kneeling down beside his bed and pulling out the box. He sits on his bed with it and rifles through the envelopes and packages trying to find the one that best applies to his situation. Hungry? No. Excited? Certainly not. Depressed? 

Adam takes a second to consider. Maybe a little bit? He’s had worse though, and he knows himself. He’s going to have a worse depression day eventually. Better to save it. He puts it back and continues his digging. 

“Oh, stressed, here we go.” 

Adam pulls out the stressed package, which is a _lovely_ neon orange color, and tears it open. 

Inside is a little roll of bubble wrap and a stress ball, along with a notecard. 

_“Bubble wrap always makes me feel better. Take it all out on those tiny little bubbles and enjoy the satisfaction of squeezing something ‘til it pops. The stress ball is for those long nights of studying when you want to squeeze the heads off of all your professors._

_I love you._

_-Caleb <3_

Adam smiles and gets to work popping those bubbles. His group, his professors, himself for forgetting his reading. He visualizes squeezing all of them to the cacophony of pop, Pop, POP! 

By the time he reaches the end of the roll, he’s feeling a lot better. It’s not a perfect solution, but it helped a lot. He blows his nose and washes his face and almost feels like a real person again. 

Adam snaps a photo of the opened package and used bubble wrap and sends it to Caleb, letting the middle finger and brain emojis do the talking for him. 

He gets a text back almost immediately. 

**Super Trouper:** :( :( :( :( 

**Super Trouper:** what happened, is there anything I can do to help?? 

**Me:** Nah, I’m fine now. The bubble wrap actually helped a lot. 

**Super Trouper:** :D :D :D 

**Super Trouper:** I’m glad!! Let me know if you need me tho, okay? I’m done w/ classes for the day so I’ll be on standby if you need me. 

**Me:** I might call you after English. Survey says I’m gonna need to -.- 

**Super Trouper:** sounds good!! Love you nerd. <3 <3 <3 

**Super Trouper:** hope you have a great rest of your day and a good time in English. 

**Me:** love you too, meathead. <3 <3 <3 

Adam lets out a woosh of air and flops down in his desk chair, spinning a little from the force, humming ABBA all the while. He does one last lazy spin before stopping himself in front of the desk. Adam flips his laptop open. It’s time to do something he should have done at the beginning of the semester. 

He digs out his wallet and pulls out his insurance card. Adam goes to the insurance’s website and starts searching for a new therapist in the area. He cross references the suggestions and reviews on multiple sites to make sure none of them are shitty people. He makes a short list of therapists who are actually taking new patients and have decent ratings and jots down the numbers. 

During his search, Adam makes a list of questions to ask the therapist. Things like: “What’s your therapy style,” “Why’d you get into therapy”, “Are you a homophobic asshole,” “What are your opinions on Atypicals?” Y’know. The important stuff. 

At his request Dr. Bright had given Adam a list of Atypical friendly therapists in the Yale area at the end of the summer. She’d warned him that they might not take him as a patient since he wasn’t atypical himself, but Adam added the names to his list anyways. 

Lists finished, Adam pulls out his phone and takes a deep breath before calling the first number on the list. 

“Hi, my name is Adam, I’m calling to see if you are taking new patients right now…” 

~~~~~

30 minutes later and Adam feels a lot more optimistic about how the rest of his semester is going to go. He’s got a couple of appointments with potential therapists including two of Dr. Bright’s recommendations over the weekend and they all seem like good people, at least from their reviews online. 

In the last hour or so before his next class starts, Adam does his World History reading and makes doubly sure that he’s got all the reading and homework done for his classes through the end of the week and puts a reminder into his phone to yell at him to finish the stuff he didn’t get to today. 

Adam also takes the time to send an email to his English professor telling her what’s happening with his group project. He gets an email back almost immediately giving him suggestions on what to do and letting him know that she wouldn’t let his grade suffer from the rest of them dragging him down. 

He packs up his stuff and heads out for his English class early, ready to lay down the law and drag the rest of his group into line kicking and screaming if necessary. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> follow me on tumblr @the-emerald7

**Author's Note:**

> Caleb raided his and his sister's sticker collections to cover the ugly flowery box that his mom let him use. The puppies and kittens are ye olde stickers Alice got when she was like 8 and then never used. The other stickers are ones Caleb got from Comic Con, supplemented by new stickers from RedBubble and other online stores.
> 
> Follow me on [Tumbr](http://the-emerald7.tumblr.com/) and come yell with me about how great TBS is!


End file.
